Trump has described global warming as a ‘hoax’ invented by the Chinese to harm manufacturing industry. Key members of his administration such as EPA boss Scott Pruitt and Energy Secretary deny climate change. His Secretary of State is ex-Exxon CEO, Rex Tillerson.

Trump said his victory would be ‘Brexit plus plus plus!’ Many of the leading campaigners for Brexit like Lord Lawson, Nigel Farage, Douglas Carswell and Owen Paterson are also pushing for a ‘Climate Exit’ or ‘Clexit’.

Lord Lawson, who was Chair of the Vote Leave campaign also founded the climate sceptic think tank Global Warming Policy Foundation (one of whose trustees is Conservative MP Peter Lilley). Nigel Farage once said, “we may have made one of the biggest stupidest collective mistakes in history by getting so worried about global warming.” Conservative MP and former Environment secretary Owen Paterson has said that the effects of climate change have been ‘exaggerated’ and “It would also lead to longer growing seasons and you could extend growing a little further north into some of the colder areas.”

Registered at the same London address are the Global Warming Policy Foundation, Owen Paterson’s UK2020 think tank, the TaxPayers’ Alliance, Business for Britain, the European Foundation, Global Vision and the Centre for Policy Studies and other influential rightwing organisations. Vote Leave was originally registered at 55 Tufton Street but in early 2016 moved to a bigger address nearby.

Last summer, some of these sceptics formed a new ‘Clexit’ group. They oppose the Paris Climate Deal, the Climate Change Act and the Government’s current Fifth Carbon Budget.

The group was formed in July/August of 2016. Its President is Christopher Monckton. The group’s founding statement denies man-made climate change, describes carbon dioxide as good for the planet and disputes climate impacts on, for example, sea level rise. Another sceptic, Lord Lawson said of the Fifth Carbon Budget, “I do believe there will be a review following the Brexit shock.”

Bob Ward, policy director at the London School of Economics’ Grantham Institute said, “This zealous ideological clique are trying to imprint their extreme agenda on government policy. It’s clear they enjoy preferential access to some parts of government and, considering their small size, they are having a disproportionate impact. This small cabal is undermining the democratic process, which should be based on robust and open debate, rather than clandestine meetings between ideological bed-fellows.” (see Independent link for footnote 3.). Another key tenant at No 55 is the European Foundation, an anti-EU think-tank (led by Conservative MP Bill Cash) that published an infamous paper during the crucial UN Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 at which world leaders desperately attempted – and failed – to agree meaningful action to tackle global warming. The research led to a front page story in the Daily Express headlined: “100 reasons why global warming is natural – no proof that human activity is to blame”.

Boris Johnson used his Telegraph column to cast doubt on climate change – suggesting that we may heading for a mini-ice age. As London Mayor he invited sceptic Matt Ridley to City Hall as part of the cultural celebration at the time to the Olympics to speak about how environmental risks are overblown. David Davis has written “The row about whether global warming exists gets even more virulent. The case is not helped by the fact that the planet appears to have been cooling, not warming, in the last decade” and campaigned against green taxes and renewable energy. Michael Gove tried to remove climate change from the National Curriculum in 2013 before backing down under pressure. Andrea Leadsom voted to oppose measures to halt climate change including against setting a target to reduce emissions in 2012 and 2016. When appointed Energy Minister in 2015 asked advisers ‘Is climate change real?’ but says she was ‘fully persuaded’ by them. Javid, who is known for his bullish free market values, has voted against laws to halt climate change and has accepted the money from the neo-Conservative free trade think tank the American Enterprise Institute– which has been funded by energy giant Exxon and financiers of climate denial Koch Brothers – to fund four trips to the US to attend and speak at the annual AEI World Forum Conference between 2011 and this year.

In a Populus poll of 119 MPs in 2014 only 30% of Conservative MPs agreed with the statement, ‘It is now an established scientific fact that climate change is largely man-made.’

These groups and individuals often campaign against climate action using free market arguments without explicit scepticism.

They will intervene in many issues–even those not at first glance about climate, such as the Steel crisis– to push their agenda.

A Daily Mail editorial called “the crippling green taxes imposed by Ed Miliband’s Climate Change Act in 2008” a “monstrous handicap” that had driven the steelworks and its 5,000 workers over the precipice.

The Spectator’s editorial said “taxes and levies designed to help Britain meet its self-imposed and unilateral carbon-reduction targets, have worsened Tata’s problems in Britain”. These sentiments were repeated by Dominic Lawson, Christopher Booker and Matt Ridley (part of the GWPF).

In August 2016 a group of eminent UK scientists criticised the Times for its ‘distorted’ coverage of climate science. They drew attention to how many articles feature Lord Lawson’s Global Warming Policy Foundation. Regular columnist Matt Ridley is a member of the GWPF’s academic advisory council. Times owner Rupert Murdoch said: “We should approach climate change with great scepticism.” Express owner, Richard Desmond is a major donor to UKIP.

We had a positive meeting with Thelma Walker, the newly elected MP for the Colne Valley constituency.

The meeting was in support of the Climate Coalition’s ‘Speak Up’ Week of Action. People across the country met with recently elected and re-elected MPs to speak up to help protect the things they love most from climate change. Read more about this.

In particular, people have asked their MPs to write to the Prime Minister to ask her to:

Reaffirm the UK’s role as a global leader, working with international allies to fully implement the Paris Agreement.

And

Ensure all government departments work together to produce an ambitious emissions reduction plan that will meet the Climate Change Act targets.

We were really pleased with how supportive Thelma Walker was. She will be writing to Theresa May on our behalf this month.

The Government’s Emissions Reduction Plan was due in late 2016 but still has not been published. This has caused alarm among politicians, industry bodies, the Committee on Climate Change and the wider public. Read more about these issues.

Our protest at the BP Big Screens event in Bradford last Friday was very successful.

The Royal Opera House accepts sponsorship from BP. Any arts organisation that accepts funding from a fossil fuel company is publicly endorsing that company. BP should not be publicly endorsed in light of its responsibility for environmental disasters, links with regimes accused of human rights abuses and obstruction on climate progress.

The protest involved our ‘decontamination team’ fliering and having conversations with the public before the show.

Once the show started we held a banner protest, displaying our new ‘Keep Fossil Fuels in the Ground’ banner.

The event was timely. It came just four days after the publication of the Carbon Majors report. This showed that 71% of total emissions have been produced by 100 companies and that BP was in 11th position in that ranking.

We wanted to say ‘No Coalition of Climate Chaos’ to Theresa May, just a few days after the confidence and supply deal with the DUP was agreed.

As George Monbiot stated last month, “The DUP is stuffed with climate change deniers, homophobes and misogynists. May’s alliance is a dishonourable coalition of chaos.”

DUP’s former environment minister, Sammy Wilson, described global warming as a ‘con’. He has lauded the benefits of fracking and described Barack Obama’s attempts to promote clean energy as ‘mad’.

Sammy Wilson said that “The Paris Agreement itself is a delusion … So pulling out of the agreement, which was only a piece of window dressing for climate chancers who wished to pretend that they were doing something about an issue which they can’t affect anyhow, is not the disaster which the green lefties are getting hysterical about.”

Not surprisingly, he deemed Trump’s decision to withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement as ‘very wise’.

But it’s not just Sammy Wilson who opposes climate action. The DUP as a whole has blocked progress on climate change. Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK not to have passed legislation designed to cut emissions. Its recent manifesto did not mention ‘climate change’, ‘environment’ or ‘global warming’ once.

The views of DUP are alarming enough. What’s even more alarming is how they find an echo in some parts of the Conservative Party and a part which is becoming more dominant since Brexit and since Trump’s victory.

Theresa May has done nothing to reverse Government backtracking on climate in 2015-16 and indeed abolished the DECC. Her trusted advisor Nick Timothy described the UK’s 2008 Climate Change Act as a “monstrous act of self-harm”.

Their 2017 manifesto proposed changes to the law to make exploratory drilling for fracking easier and to promote a shale gas ‘revolution’. This policy did not appear in the recent Queen’s Speech and appears to have been ditched – but this will not signal a retreat on fracking.

This alarm has been reinforced by the appointment of Michael Gove as the new Conservative Environment Minister. Caroline Lucas said: ‘It is hard to think of many politicians as ill-equipped for the role of Environment Secretary as Mr Gove. His record of voting against measures to halt climate change and his attempt to wipe the subject from our children’s curriculum show him entirely unfit to lead our country in tackling one of the greatest threats we face’.

Michael Gove’s ex-colleague in the cabinet, Ed Davey echoed these concerns. He stated that “Gove’s appointment is a threat to the British fight against climate change. Uniquely for a cabinet minister, Gove turned the word “expert” into a snarling insult. Truly, Donald Trump would have been proud.”

Davey analysed Gove’s track record in playing to the climate sceptic audience, undermining Amber Rudd’s attendance at UN conferences and trying to remove climate change from the curriculum.

The protest will not in any way disrupt the performance. We have informed Bradford police of our plans.

All are welcome to join us. We think that, in this case, it’s important for us to be aware of numbers and to have a conversation with people joining us before the event. Please email us by 11th July if you’re thinking of joining us, even if you aren’t 100% sure.

What’s wrong with BP?

BP has repeatedly caused environmental catastrophes and propped up regimes accused of human rights abuses in multiple countries where it operates.

BP has invested at least £1.6 billion in tar sands extraction in Canada.

BP sponsors the arts to generate good publicity. It helps BP present itself as a caring, generous member of the community, whilst continuing to destroy the environment and contribute to human rights abuses around the world.

We call this ‘artwash’.

The arts and cultural institutions that accept sponsorship from BP are effectively legitimising BP’s actions, by giving them positive publicity. It taints the reputation of those institutions.

BP provides less than 1% of the income of the Royal Opera House. BP needs the Royal Opera House more than it needs BP. Furthermore, recent research has shown that – in light of the £210 million per year subsidies given to BP – we can say that BP arts sponsorships are really funded by us, the taxpayers.

Funding for the arts is vital. We support increased Government funding for the arts. This could be more than paid for by ending subsidies to BP.

Cultural organisations are already cutting links with BP. In 2016, both the Tate and the Edinburgh International Festival dropped BP. This didn’t stop the Edinburgh festival producing a fantastic programme of world-leading performance art in August 2016.

Hundreds of individual artists and arts organisations have already made the Oil Sponsorship Free Commitment not to accept funding from fossil fuel companies.

On Wednesday, we visited Preston New Road in Lancashire to oppose fracking and show solidarity with the local struggle against it. The visit was also a further opportunity to raise awareness of the ‘One Million Climate Jobs’ campaign with its positive alternatives to fracking.

We visited on a day when they believe part of the drill arrived. While we were there, it was also visited by Young Friends of the Earth campaigners from across Europe.

It’s expected that fracking will take place at the site off Preston New Road within the next few weeks and months. It has been the scene of daily protests since the beginning of construction work in early January. You can read about protests on Tina Rothery’s blog http://tinalouiseuk.blogspot.co.uk/

In the next few weeks candidates in Colne Valley, Dewsbury, Huddersfield and Spen Valley will be appearing at hustings to make their pitch to local voters.

Would you like to ask a question on climate or environment in your constituency’s hustings?

If you’re looking for inspiration we’ve complied a set of questions that you may be interested in asking (General Election 2017 Hustings questions). These questions include links and references so you can read around the topics if you wish. If you decide to ask a question, we’d be interested to hear from you – and to hear of the candidates’ responses.

Many thanks to the 30+ people who joined the Huddersfield March for Climate, Justice, Jobs & Health on Saturday 29th April.

The event was our contribution to the global wave of demonstrations to protest against Donald Trump as he reached his 100 days’ landmark.

We wanted to show solidarity with the people of America and to protest against Trump’s racism, his misogyny and threat to reproductive rights, his corporate cronyism, his attack on healthcare and his climate denial and fossil fuel agenda. Finally, we wanted to connect our UK struggles with the resistance in America.

Speakers included representatives of Kirklees Stand Up to Racism, the SWP and the Labour Party.

The march made its way from Nelson Mandela Corner to Market Place, the site of four anti-Trump protests in the past 100 days organised by Kirklees Stand Up to Racism and previous protests against the financing of fossil fuel projects in the US by the banks in or near Market Place.

From there we fed into Huddersfield TUC’s March for the NHS.

We were really pleased to support this march: to oppose cuts, closures and privatisation in the NHS and to Save Huddersfield A&E.

In our speech at the closing rally, we were pleased to draw connections between the NHS march and the global protests happening against Trump and between the struggle for a strong health service and the struggle for a safe climate and healthy environment. Finally, were pleased to salute Huddersfield TUC and the Hands Off HRI campaign and to thank them for their work.

Thank you to all the different groups who contributed to the event and promoted the event – in particular Colne Valley Labour, Hands Off HRI, Huddersfield Friends of the Earth, Huddersfield Greenpeace, Huddersfield TUC, Kirklees Stand Up to Racism and Kirklees SWP.

We re-created our ‘First Step Brexit, Next Step Clexit’ stunt to send off the marchers at the beginning of the rally. You can read about the nexus of nationalism, neo-liberalism and climate denial and its centre of operations at 55 Tufton Street in our earlier webstory.

It was good to see in the crowd a number of Campaign Against Climate Change placards about Trump and fliers promoting the London march on 29 April.

The march made its way to Westminster, ending at Parliament Square for speeches.

We gave out more copies of our flier before one final re-creation of the Farage/ Trump stunt at 55 Tufton Street itself, just a few metres from Parliament.

One week from now we’ll be marching in Huddersfield for the March for Climate, Justice, Jobs and Health in Huddersfield.

“Attacks on science don’t just hurt scientists, they hurt scientists’ ability to protect the people, and climate change epitomizes that. When politicians cater to fossil fuel interests by denying the basic realities of climate science and pursuing anti-science climate policy, they endanger the jobs, justice, and livelihoods of ordinary people everywhere.”

At that time, Jason McCartney delivered one of the key asks of that week by writing to the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to ask him topublish an ambitious low-carbon investment plan to transform the economy in line with the Climate Change Act.

In yesterday’s letter, constituents expressed their concern that the Government has still not published the ‘Emissions Reduction Plan’.

According to the Independent on 27th March, “the Emissions Reduction Plan, was supposed to be published last year. In January, the Climate Change Minister Nick Hurd said it would be ready by the end of March, but the Government later refused to stand by this deadline. ClientEarth, a group of environmental legal activists, has threatened to sue the Government for breaking its own laws if the delay continues.”

Constituents stated, “We believe that publishing and acting on this plan should be made a priority. Not only will it help us to achieve essential reductions in carbon emissions, but it will also create jobs, boost the economy and improve health. We share the views of the CEOs of thirty businesses and organisations about the benefits of a Clean Growth Plan in the area of energy efficiency expressed in a Clean Growth Plan letter to Secretary of State for BEIS on 27 March.”

Jason McCartney MP has also agreed to write to the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to find out when the Government plans to publish the ‘Emissions Reduction Plan’ / ‘Clean Growth Plan’.